Most likely AUR is the main issue here. I’ve specially avoided it to make my system as simple and easy as possible, so my experience has been a bit different. The thing about Arch is that every system is unique, and it’s hard to say something that would apply to all of them.
Is there a community where we can post whatever the popular opinion happens to be at the time? A sister community for !unpopularopinion@lemmy.world seems to be increasingly necessary.